1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an on-board recording system that records vehicle information concerning a state of a vehicle, when it detects particular types of vehicle behaviors including activation of driving assistance functions.
2. Description of Related Art
An on-board recording system is known which records vehicle information (information concerning an operating state of the vehicle, control state of the vehicle, environmental conditions around the vehicle, status of the driver of the vehicle, etc.) when it detects particular types of vehicle behaviors (see, for example, Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2007-293536 (JP 2007-293536 A)). With the on-board recording system, various analyses concerning vehicle behaviors (e.g., analysis of the process leading to a particular vehicle behavior, change of the vehicle state corresponding to a particular vehicle behavior, etc.) can be conducted.
For example, the types of vehicle behaviors for which vehicle information is recorded may include activation of driving assistance functions (e.g., a driving assistance function for steering stability, a driving assistance function for collision avoidance, etc.) installed on the vehicle. These driving assistance functions are often provided as optional equipment.
However, a memory having a relatively small capacity is often employed as a memory (e.g., a non-volatile memory, such as EEPROM) for recording vehicle information, because of the usage environment (for example, a temperature environment of a wide range from a high temperature to an extremely low temperature), high cost due to the durability and reliability, and limited installation space in the first place, for example. In this case, when a recording area for recording corresponding vehicle information is allocated for each type of vehicle behavior to be detected, the recording area can only be allocated for each type of vehicle behavior to be detected, to such an extent that data corresponding to the minimum number of times of detection necessary for useful analysis can be recorded. Therefore, when a certain driving assistance function as optional equipment is not installed on the vehicle, it is desirable that the recording area that can be used for recording vehicle information corresponding to activation of the driving assistance function as optional equipment is effectively utilized for recording vehicle information corresponding to another type of vehicle behavior.